


Dedication

by yeolinski



Category: Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Bad dates, M/M, Painting, Pining, Wittiness, art major, basically jaehwan hooking up ongniel, jaehwan being jaehwan, ongnielweek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2019-05-18 15:42:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14855558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yeolinski/pseuds/yeolinski
Summary: In which Jaehwan wants to ask, he really does, but he doesn’t really know how to bring it up at this point. “Oh hey dude, I’ve been taking a picture of you  obsessively painting another dude for 9 weeks, hahaha, but you have amazing skills, bro!”





	Dedication

**Author's Note:**

> HELLO FRIENDS! THIS IS MY ENTRY FOR ONGNIEL WEEK DAY SEVEN :D  
> i'm super late on my day 3 - but at least I got this one going for me... I'm not even sure if this counts as totally ongniel, but like... if the prompt is just like "JAEHWAN HOOKING UP ONGNIEL" then it is. :>
> 
> IT IS HEAVILY BASED ON [THIS TWEET](https://twitter.com/yeolinski/status/998465776528056321), BECAUSE DANIEL WOULD AND JAEHWAN WOULD DEF BE THERE TO MAKE SURE HE DIDN'T FORGET IT LOL.

The second class on Jaehwan’s first day is a boring mandatory class the university has all the students take on their first semester. 

Social studies, just without actually anything that resembles social studies. 

It’s literal hell. It’s basically just rows of computers set up one against the other, and they have to answer some questions, listen to a lecture about social issues, then answer the same set of questions on the computer, again, as if to see if they changed their mind after hearing more about the issue. And they have attendance taken. You can only miss one class. Fuck his life.

Out spite, he decides that he’ll answer the exact same answers to both questionnaires, even if he doesn’t actually think anything remotely close to that about the subject just to mess with the results. He spends the entire class watching the dude in the row in front of his painting the dude who's sitting across him in microsoft paint. Fascinating. 

 

.

 

On the third week of classes, Jaehwan finishes up on some homework during his social studies class, and also plays some online games. 

Literally everybody are messing around with the computers and nobody is even trying to pay attention. 

Last week he played runescape for like an hour. It was like he was back in junior high. The trick was to tune in the social warrior justice crying about a lost cause on the podium at the front, when it’s obvious she had literally never done anything other than type some angry comments on twitter. Today they have a student that speaks about cult-culture in South Korea.

Maybe next time Jaehwan should have a go at this. Tell everybody about topics he feels passionate about. Reducing tuition by canceling this class is one. 

After trying to login back in runescape and feastively understanding he forgot both the password and the username (‘iloveASS96’ was taken and it was his to-go nick. His other to-go nickname; ‘Lord_of_all_things_kim_jaehwan’ was too long, so he has no idea what name he typed out instead of those two), he looks about the room.

A handful of students are just sleeping. The guy beside him has his head literally hanging back and his mouth opened. Jaehwan kills down the urge to shove an eraser in there.  

The dude in the next row is painting something in microsoft paint. He’s arts like him. Jaehwan calls him pink-hoodie, simply because Jaehwan can’t be expected to remember everybody’s name unless he’s sexually interested in them. Jaehwan raises his head a bit to see what is it that he’s painting, and hey, it’s a human. 

He’s  _ good _ !

Really good, actually. He’s just using a black pen, over a white canvas - but come on, even that is a mastery considering how actually difficult it is to do something in MS Paint, unless you’re doing an incompetent presentation to a bunch of toddlers. 

He painted a guy in a black hoodie, with his eyes closed, and earphones in. Even the earphone cable looked realistic, white against the hoodie. It was just a doodle tho, but he was clearly putting in some effort into it. 

Wasn’t he doing the same thing two weeks ago, too? 

Jaehwan rubs his head and tilts his head slightly to the left. Now that the dude’s head is out of the way, he sees the subject of the painting. 

It’s the guy whose sitting across him. 

He fall asleep with his earphones in, just like literally everybody else. 

Jaehwan fishes out his phone, changes his angle a bit, and takes a picture. The back of the pink-hoodie-dude, black-hoodie-dude, and the painting, all together in one shot. Then he zooms in and takes another picture of the painting. 

He posts it on snapchat and writes “Imagine being this good as MS paint”.

 

.

 

On the week after that, pink-hoodie dude is no longer pink-hoodie dude. 

He has an english name, so it’s easy to remember. 

Daniel. 

It must be said with a british accent, or at least some change of tone, otherwise it may not be valid in court.  Or anywhere else for that matter. 

Daniel actually thinks that’s funny. 

Well they only talked twice, so he’ll probably think it’s annoying soon. Jaehwan has that sort of effect on people. 

He seems okay, though; he looks like a bit of a thug, but he has a picture of a cat on his screen phone, so he can’t be that bad.

On social studies, Daniel is painting the guy in front of him again. Today the other dude is wearing a flannel shirt, cheek in his hand as he studies something on his computer, headphones tucked in safely in his ears.

That’s exactly what Daniel paints. This time he takes a bit longer on the hair; instead of basic doodle hair, he takes time with each strand, erasing and repainting until it resembles the original.

Jaehwan is sorta transfixed with how much effort he puts into it, clicking his tongue when he messes up, erasing and then repainting. 

He’s clearly a hardworking dude. 

Probably would be a good match with Jaehwan for the year-end projects, so he could sit back and watch him do all the work. 

He’s done right before they finish the lecture, and Jaehwan takes another picture, just to ask him about his MSpaint skills later, but forgets all about it. 

 

.

 

Jaehwan’s exhausted on thursday, and spends his social studies class with his head between his arms, napping. Whenever he looks up, momentarily awake, nothing interesting is happening, and even Daniel spends it fiddling and installing things on the old computer the school provided.

But next social class, he walks in with his graphic tablet in hand, looking pretty satisfied with himself. 

By that time Jaehwan could say they’re  _ acquainted _ , so he waves to him and Jaehwan waves back, so he wouldn’t disappoint the poor old chap. He’s clearly desperate for friends. 

As they call attendance, Daniel wastes some time plugging it in and adjusting it into the computer.

Jaehwan is minutely distracted by the people beside him playing some card game, the actual lecture (horses, today they are talking about horses - Jaehwan rode a pony once, when he was five. His mom keeps a picture to prove it. Other than that he is less than interested.) and the girl who's watching a Buzzfeed Unsolved two computers away.

Once he returns his gaze to Daniel, trying to find something else to busy his eyes with, he finds out that Daniel is doodling again, this time properly; in photoshop. 

He’s freaking good at this. 

Like hella good. Like fantastic. 

Like actual artist material. Not just some art student.

Clearly he’s much better at this than in MSpaint. His strokes are fast and precise. 

He’s also done much faster with the doodle, now that he has a graphic tablet and actual tools to work with. He sighs, clearly accomplished, and leans down his chair. Like always, Daniel’s subject has earphones tucked in, but today his books and notebook are opened, and he’s finishing up on some homework. In the drawing Daniel did, black-hoodie guy has an chic urban feel to it, and his button nose is accentuated. It’s such an upgrade from paint, and clearly Daniel has added his own style and taste to it. 

Jaehwan takes another picture, just to compare it with the one he took a week ago, before Daniel closes the app - and wow. He’s a pro.

 

.

 

Fast forward to next week, and would you look at that, Daniel is painting the same dude,  _ again _ . 

Somehow Jaehwan was anticipating it.

Jaehwan is almost tempted to text him about this, because when he tries to reach out and tug him, the teacher clears her throat and looks at him. They can do whatever they want as long as they’re quiet, and Jaehwan wonders why do they even put funds into this class. Self-study has more merit than this. 

He and Daniel are sort of friends now. Kinda.

Jaehwan didn’t needed friends, friends are overrated, but Daniel looked really lonely surrounded by all those people who thought he’s charming and funny (and tall and handsome), so Jaehwan didn’t mind to give a helping hand to this poor dude who also plays league of legends. 

Also Daniel thinks he’s hilarious. Always a good trait in friends. 

They even scheduled a League of Legends lan party on Friday after classes. But for Friday to come, they needed to survive this excruciating thursday social studies class. 

At least looking at him go at the blank page, fills him with a sense of purpose. 

He wanted to see how today’s painting will go. 

Today Daniel dabbed in some rosy color on his cheeks and nose. Some brown streaks among the black color of his hair. 

He’s not wearing headphones today, just playing something idly on his computer, and Daniel made him seem like an excerpt from a comics.

At some point he glances at Daniel, and smiles, because he probably caught Daniel watching him. 

Daniel nods to him.

He nods back and goes to the computer.

Maybe they know each other or something. Probably. 

He still takes another picture.

By now it’s tradition. 

  
  


.

 

How is he so good at this? 

Although Jaehwan has better things to do, the way Daniel obsesses about his social studies weekly painting is fascinating.

The next two weeks he goes from simple doodling to actual digital portraits that could probably sell online for a good buck.

He adds in a lot of small stuff that really make a differences; three moles on his cheek, a curve at his lip, a sparkle in the eye that really brings out how bright and beautiful his subject is.

And Jaehwan can kinda see it, sometimes. Although he just wears comfortable simple clothes, and although he doesn’t color his hair or wears flashy earrings - the dude is clearly handsome. No, not even just handsome, his visuals are just unusual. He gets why he could be a perfect practice dummy. 

But he can’t help but get transfixed with how methodical Daniel works, how meticulous. It’s almost like he’s more invested into these paintings than actual art assignments they get in class.

It’s not until after midterms, Jaehwan actually catches up.

They’re heading toward social studies with Daniel, with some dude, whose name Jaehwan doesn’t even remember, and doesn’t pretend to. He keeps on calling him another name every time they meet just to piss him off, and it’s been fun so far. 

You don’t really get to do much fun things in college, so this was something he sincerely enjoyed.

So this dude goes; “God, I hate these lessons.” 

And Daniel says; “Yeah me, too.” 

And the dude continues; “What are we expected to do for an hour and a half, even? Like the computer lags so I can’t even play games.” 

“I finish up homework assignments. It’s sort of like self-study but with somebody talking in the background. It helps me get focused when I’m actively ignoring somebody.” Jaehwan admits. 

“And you, Daniel? What do you do?” The dude urges, almost as if he needs ideas on what to do during class.

Daniel rubs his head, which is already suspicious because Daniel only rubs his head when he thinks, and Jaehwan happened to notice he rarely ever really  _ thinks  _ about what he has to say. He’s an up-front kind of guy, that would lay down everything the way it is, which is a trait he liked in a potential future bestie.

“Well… I nap, usually…” It’s such a blatant lie that even the dude looks like he struggles to believe him. Which is hilarious. 

“No, you don’t.” He corrects, and Daniel’s face makes this odd, outraged expression. “I sit right behind you.” Jaehwan continues, but before he could expose him, Daniel’s expression turns from outrage to sheer panic, when some other dude passes by them waving slightly, looking pointedly at Daniel.

Daniel almost instinctively, like somebody flipped a switch, waves back. 

He has his earphones in, and he stops and walks backwards, then turns to them, and plucks out one of his earphones. 

Jaehwan squints. He knows him from somewhere. 

“Daniel - right? We have Art History together.” 

“Y-yeah.” Daniel’s ears turn pink. 

“Did you finish up on the assignment due tomorrow?”

It’s like somebody left Daniel on standby. He’s not even blinking. His ears are slowly turning more red by the minute.

The dude makes this weird gesture, cocking his head to the side, like a cat, and Jaehwan can literally hear Daniel’s brains exploding all over the little chamber inside his head that was keeping them running. 

Then he gets it.

This is black-hoodie! From Daniel’s painting. Just, like… in a white hoodie, today. 

And Daniel is crushing on him. 

Pretty hard by the looks of it. 

Like, about to have an actual heart attack because the dude came up to talk to him - that sort of hard, shy, schoolboy crush.

Daniel glances at him, which is probably the biggest SOS plea Jaehwan had ever received in his entire life. 

“Oh my god, he totally forgot.” Jaehwan snorts, and hits Daniel’s arm. 

“Oh.” The dude makes a face. “I have no idea how to start. And I don’t really know anybody in that class, either…” 

“Daniel’s free after social studies, though. Maybe you guys can finish it together, because I have a strict no-copy-cats policy on all my assignments.” It’s complete and utter crap, Jaehwan isn’t even taking Art History this semester. 

“Yes!” Daniel’s outburst is so loud, that even the dude standing beside Jaehwan - what’s-his-name - cringes. “I mean - yes, I’m free. Library - we can meet in the library. Today. Or like later too, I’m free later too, if you have classes.” 

Black-hoodie smiles; “Okay, then after social studies then.” He nods. 

Daniel is about to melt. It’s disgusting. His eyes look like they’re about to get teary, his nostrils are enlarged, and his overall expression looks like a person who just jizzed his pants but was holding it in. 

It’s horrible. So horrible. Nobody should ever date Daniel. 

Well, except Black-hoodie guy - who sorta nods again, mumbles something about his locker and disappears.

Jaehwan waits until he’s completely, utterly, totally out of range, then turns to Daniel.

He’s just lamely looks after him like a kicked puppy, but before Jaehwan can speak, the what’s-his-face goes; “So - um… are we going to class, or…?” 

“You go in, Dave, save us a table.” 

“But the chairs are assigned - and my name isn’t Dave.”

“Don’t be so insulted, Peter, your name is really difficult to remember.” 

“It isn’t Peter either! Why are you making out weird english names? I’m korean.” 

“Daniel has a weird english name, so you should have a weird english name too, because my name is korean. And I’m a special snowflake. There can’t be two special snowflakes, or you can’t be friends with us.” 

“Oh my god. You make up a new excuse every time, it’s almost admirable!” He throws his hands up but walks in through the door. 

“ _ Thank you for the assist, Jaehwan _ !” Jaehwan pushes Daniel’s shoulder; “ _ How would I ever talk to my crush, if not you, Jaehwan _ !” 

“You know how deer just stand in the middle of the road when they see you coming because they’re scared shitless? That was me right now. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god.” He walks back and forth for a few times and clutches onto his hair, before finally looking back at Jaehwan. “Wait - how did you know…?” 

“Are you serious? You’ve been painting him for every week since the start of the semester. I sit right behind you, man. I thought you’re just practicing on him! Not having some weird stalkery-vibe paintings of him!“

“At first, I was. Practicing, I mean. It was just means to waste some time. But then, like… did you see him? He’s stunning. The more I looked at him, the more perfect he seemed. I couldn’t stop noticing him during classes, and observing the way he is. His hands, how he walks, how he talks... And then he also smiled at me, this one time while in class. I jacked off so many times to just that during the weekend, I finished an entire tissue box.”

“WOW - wow, wow, too much information, my man. Too much  _ creepy  _ information. My fragile mind can’t take it.” 

“What do I do now? I’m going to vibrate into hypersonic velocity if I stay alone with him. This was a good idea - but a bad idea.” 

“Oh, please. You’ll do fine. You’re Kang Daniel, Campus hunk, the wet fantasy of the entire department. Girls jizz their pants when you take off your shirt. You got all this bad boy vibe going, they don’t even know you’re a nerd. Just like… don’t freeze. And don’t talk about how much you jacked off.”

Daniel rubs his face. 

  
  


.

 

It does go well, like Jaehwan anticipated.

Because Jaehwan is a modern day prophet and he knows all things. 

Except maybe it goes too well? 

“We finished the assignment.” Daniel reports back, the next day in class.

“And?” 

“And we talked about the teacher being an asshole.” 

“And?” 

“And we might be going on sunday to watch infinity war, together.” 

“Yay—” Jaehwan makes a face because Daniel is making a face. “Or… nay...?”

“It’s just… I don’t know. It didn’t feel like a date-date thing. I was really nervous the entire time, and I think I fucked up a lot… and I might have said like ‘no homo’ twice.”

Jaehwan slaps his forehead.

“I didn't mean to! I was just like watching him write, and he was just, like, his eyebrows were furrowed like this—” Daniel furrows his eyebrows as if Jaehwan never saw how people furrow their eyebrows, it’s like a new discovery, something that nobody ever did before; “ — and I thought, wow, he’s even cute when he’s trying to be serious, and like his cute little moles - okay, so I went like ‘Your moles are cute’. And he kinda just raised his eyes on me, I panicked and I said; ‘No homo!’ and started laughing, and he smiles and just dismissed it.” 

“But it was ‘yes homo’, Daniel, it was totally ‘yes homo’.” 

“I just said I panicked.” 

“Hmm...” Jaehwan crosses his hands on his chest; “When he raised his eyes at you, was it like… a weirded out gaze? Or an interested gaze?”

“It was neither? It was just sorta blank? I don’t know.”

“Okay - Because you can still salvage this, man. Just like flirt with him. Show you’re interested.” 

“You make it sound so easy.” 

“You just need a game plan.” 

  
  


.

 

The game plan crushes and burns like a meteor going into the sun. 

It’s actually so disastrous, Jaehwan actually senses a disturbance in the force as it’s happening, and sends him a message to ask him how’s it going. 

The reply is “I’m quitting uni and moving to the north to milk cows and live off my own urine”.

Jaehwan waits for him to elaborate after he’s already home from his date. 

“I was friendzoned. It was horrible. I wanted to cry. I think I did cry. I couldn’t even watch the movie. I dont even know what movie we were watching. Fuck that pink Thanos guy. My vision was blurry.” 

“What—? stop being such a whiny wuss and tell me what happened.” 

“So we meet up, we grab a sweet snack. He’s fucking beautiful, because his shirt has this low v cut and he—”

“Focus!” 

“Yes, okay, so the syropy thing that he was eating was dripping and he licked it, looking directly at me. I didn’t fuck up, I looked straight at him and maybe like licked my own lips. He should be a god damn porn star, his tongue is just—” 

“Are you going to tell me what went wrong or what?” 

“God - yes, just like… wait I’m getting there. So we’re at the cinema.and problem number one rises. We started arguing over who's going to pay for the popcorn. He says he’s the hyung, so he should pay - but I kinda wanted to like… court him, so I insisted I should pay. Hold on.” He actually blowing his nose on some tissue on the other side of the line, and Jaehwan holds the phone away from his ear, just in case his overly sentimental germs might reach him somehow through the phone lines.

“So I went and paid the cashier, because there was a line behind us, and he clearly was displeased with this, so here we were, standing there, arguing, and these two female classmates appear out of nowhere, and started talking to us, and hey, they came to watch the Infinity War, too. Great. And he was nice and smiley with them, like… it was obvious he was still angry about the popcorn thing.”

“I’m sure he wasn’t angry about the popcorn thing, you’re reading too much into it—” 

“That’s like the more pleasant part of the date!” Daniel blows his nose into another tissue. “Right before the movie starts, one of the girls asked if she could sit between us, because she was easily frightened - he was weirded out, but still agreed, and then like it occurred to us that they were totally picking us up? It became a weird blind double date. What the fuck, even - the girl kept trying to put her hand on mine, and every time she would, I’d draw it back - but one time I glanced at him afterwards, and he totally noticed, our eyes met in the dark, and he turned back to the screen, real fast and cleared his throat.” 

“Dude.” Jaehwan actually feels sorry for him. 

“As if this wasn’t enough, because the girls started fighting about who's the most handsome one; Loki or Thor, they pushed me and I spilled my soda on him. I went after him to the bathroom - I don’t know what was I thinking, was I really going to assist him wiping his pants, god, I just stood there awkwardly wondering if I could like turn back time, and he was like ‘that girl really likes you… you should ask her out.’ and I was watching his crotch, and I sorta said ‘yeah…’ because I was distracted. So he dumps all his tissues into the trash bin and goes; ‘I need to go home’ and I’m like ‘okay, yeah, me too’ and he goes home.” 

“Okay, no offence, man, but you fucked yourself over. Nobody is at fault here.”

“I know! That’s why I’m going to become a recluse. And like… live in the forest. With deer to keep me company. And Chickens. And no people to remind me of today.” 

Jaehwan is quiet for a moment, going over the story again in his head. It’s obvious to him, now, that campus Hunk Daniel cannot be left to his own devices. He looks like he’s all that, but he’s having a mental breakdown at midnight, because some dude has three moles on his cheek.

“First of all, go buy some ice-cream and get your serotonin levels in check. You totally ruined my image of you. I’m disappointed, and you should be too. The Men of League of Legends don’t cry. We’re warriors damnit.” 

“Warriors cry too, so fuck you.” Daniel decides. “I’m eating jellies to drown out my sorrow.”

“Did he sound angry when he said he was going home?” 

“Kinda? Like not totally, but the way he threw the tissues into the trashcan looked a bit passive aggressive.” 

“Maybe he got pissed off about the girls just as much as you did?” 

Daniel stops sniffing. “You think?” 

“Yeah.” Jaehwan rubs his pencil on his head. “You could still turn it around, buddy, don’t worry. Jaehwan the Great never leaves a friend that needs an Assist on the battlefield.” 

 

.

 

The next social studies, Daniel pathetically paints black-hoodie guy in a suit, fixing the viewer with a cold gaze as he works on the cuff of his button up. 

Black-hoodie guy doesn’t seem that hostile, and taps him with his pen between the computers to ask something. 

The minute that happens, Daniel perks up, like a puppy. If he had a tail, he’d wag it.

It’s almost cute, if Jaehwan didn’t puke a little in his mouth. 

He needs to help the poor guy to get some of that black-hoodie dick. Or ass. Or both. Whatever the hell he was jacking off to. 

After class they’re both talking about something and Jaehwan kindly suggests they all go to this restaurant place across campus. Best fried chicken he ever tasted. Dude-guy tags along with them, even though nobody asked him, but it’s a minor setback, because once they arrive there, Jaehwan festively announces that him and dude-guy have something to do. 

Dude-guy doesn’t want to go, but Jaehwan pinches his side painfully, until he realizes he has no other option but to leave the premises with him. 

“What the fuck, I’m starving.” 

“You’ll get over it, Steve.” Jaehwan spies from one of the windows, scaring the couple sitting beside the window. 

“Are you trying to hook them up or something?” 

“What was your first clue? You know what don’t answer that, you wouldn’t have tagged along if you were any smarter.”

“You’re a bit of an asshole.” Dude-guy says, clinging to the window above Jaehwan. “But this is for a good cause, so I guess you’re forgiven.” 

Daniel and black-hoodie are just sitting there, looking awkward. Black-hoodie rubs his nape. Their gazes cross and then they both start laughing, and Jaehwan literally cringes.

Jaehwan fishes out his phone and types in; “Daniel, it’s time to take out the big guns. Think about the funniest joke you ever heard.”

Daniel checks his phone, looks around, then catches black-hoodie’s gaze, and starts talking. 

The joke is way too long, because he’s still talking after a whole minute, and he does so with a lot of hand movements and at some point, black-hoodie guy just looks confused.

“ABORT MISSION! USE A KNOCK KNOCK JOKE!” Jaehwan sends next.

Clearly Daniel never heard any good knock-knock jokes, because black-hoodie guy looks even more confused, but still like forces out a laugh. 

“Jonathan, do you know any good ice-breaker jokes?” 

“How are you coming up with new names, all the time? I don’t think you’ve ever called me a name twice. I’d be insulted, if you weren’t putting so much effort into it.”

Jaehwan doesn’t answer, because he’s googling good jokes. 

“Why did the guitar teacher get arrested?” Dude-guy suddenly says, and Jaehwan raises his eyes to him. “For fingering a minor.” He’s still looking at the window, though, at Daniel and black-hoodie, but it’s a freaking amazing joke. It’s just dirty enough to make an instant shock, and save Daniel from all the mess Daniel made for himself, but not dirty enough to be in total bad taste, since it’s a joke. It should, for the very least, get black-hoodie guy to have an amused outrage, which is better than pity-laugh.

“Didn’t think you had it in you, Samuel. You didn’t strike me as a guy that makes good jokes.” Jaehwan types the joke in and presses on send. 

“Yeah, all Samuels have weird humor.” 

Jaehwan is sorta amused because he’s playing along with him, but then they both witness black-hoodie guy, who had been just sipping water, spitting all his water on Daniel. 

“What is wrong with him…?” Jaehwan shakes his head. “I mean, can’t he read the mood, and wait to tell the punchline after he swallows the water? Seriously? Like normal people?”

“I think he just really likes him.” Dude-guy says. “He’s nervous.”

Black-hoodie guy is apologizing, and dabbing napkins on Daniel’s face and arms. Daniel’s nose is scrunched up and his eyes are shut tight, and it just looks real tragic. 

He’s probably thinking about being a recluse and milking cows, again.

But then he says something, and black-hoodie laughs, and says something back that makes Daniel’s shoulders slump from the tense position they were in for the entire time, and he tells something that makes them both laugh. 

“It worked.” Dude-guy sounds a bit surprised, and honestly, so is Jaehwan. 

The waitress comes to take their order, and they’re both smiling, and the mood is definitely different. 

Jaehwan wants to stay there to make sure Daniel doesn’t fuck up, but one of the resturant owners comes out to scold them and tell them they’re disrupting the clients, so they sorta have to go. 

He and dude-guy go out to eat some noodles across the street, and like 15 minutes into the food, Daniel shows up, hands crossed on his chest, and sits down next to Jaehwan. 

“How could you fuck this up? Seriously? You had it in the bag when we left.”

“My ex showed up! She sat down next to me and started to talk about how much she missed me. I didn’t see her since high-school graduation, jesus.” 

Dude-guy is still slurping on his noodles calmly, as if he doesn’t understand the gravity of the situation. “So?” He says.

“So she just kept sitting there, and Seongwoo was just listening to her bullshit with furrowed eyebrows. He just looked so troubled when she started fabricating a sob story about what she’s been through the past couple of months, being all clingy, so he said he had to go, and then - get this, he  _ winked  _ at me and gave me thumbs up, when he was walking away.” 

“He’s straight.” Jaehwan rules. “Problem solved. Find another dude to crush on.” 

“No way.” Dude-guy says, still chewing; “I have Color Theory with him, and I’ve never seen him smiling so genuinely and so wide - I think he’s into you. But now that he seen your ex, and it’s a girl, he probably understood he doesn’t have any chance with you, because you’re straight.”

“Then what, pry tell, would you suggest to do, Richard? Huh? Because that right there—” He points to Daniel’s general direction; “That’s some divine intervention shit. It’s like the gods themselves don’t want them to end up together.”

“That’s easy. Just tell him you like him.”

Daniel looks like he considers it. 

“That never works.” Jaehwan rules, just to be cross, but Daniel looks like it’s a great idea. “It won’t work.” He shakes his head. 

“It just might.” 

 

.

 

The next class of social studies, Jaehwan takes a picture of Daniel painting black-hoodie as a royal prince. 

The prince looks sort of sombre, the same way black-hoodie looks like in his seat today, looking a bit tired, and listening to his music to pass the time as he stares blankly at the screen of his computer. 

The detailing is amazing. He works on the beads and the embroidery on the clothes, and it’s a goddamn masterpiece. 

At this point Jaehwan doesn’t even know why he’s taking pictures and wonders if he’ll ever confess this strange addiction to Daniel.

Some people smoke cigarettes, some people do meth, and Jaehwan collects pictures of Daniel being borderline creepy and painting a dude without his consent.

But then the class is finished, and Daniel is pretending to mess with his bag, as black-hoodie packs up his stuff, and leaves toward the door. 

Daniel catches up to him at the end of the row. 

“Hey, can I have your phone number?” 

It takes a moment for black-hoodie to digest that, his eyes wide like plates.

“Um, yeah, sure.” He answers, almost hurriedly. 

“Great. Because - every time we meet stuff always happen, you head home in a rush, and I never seem to find the moment to ask for it.”  

If before he looks tired and tense, now black-hoodie’s face lights up like a goddamn christmas tree when he smiles. “I don’t  _ head home in a rush _ . I make a smooth exit.” He defends himself; “Just like - Yeah, okay. It’s 010-...”

Dude-guy slaps him up his head as he heads toward the door, (really painful and uncalled for, only Jaehwan is allowed to friendly-hit people, dude-guy should know this by now), then gives him a triumph look over his shoulder; “Told you it’d work.” 

Jaehwan mimics him using an annoying voice, because he’s not below that, and adds “This means nothing. All relationships are based on lies and deceit, or they don’t work. You’re wrong about everything, and I’m always right. The sooner you come to terms with this, William, the better.”

 

.

 

Jaehwan hates being right. 

By next social studies class, it’s obvious, nothing changed at all, and although Daniel seems to be in friendly terms with his crush, they have established a strict hands-off agenda, and settled for awkward smiles and stolen glances across the computers between them. 

The goddamn romeo and juliet of social studies. Jaehwan wants to play a sad violin song to commemorate their sad love story. 

Daniel even paints his portrait in murky dark blue and teal colors, eyes sparkling in the darkness as he looks away to the left, away from the viewer, as if he might just glance back any second. 

On the weekend, they’re at Daniel’s place, because Jaehwan’s asshole roommate was having a fit about cleaning up after them (Minhyun is always having a fit about something, though. Two days ago he had a fit about Jaehwan’s socks being next to his face toner. They were semi-clean. He wore them only once. Drama queen.)

“We decided to stay friends.” Daniel says.

“We? As in you and him together?”

“You talked about it?” Dude-guy cuts Jaehwan off.

“He rejected you?” Jaehwan continues, because obviously that’s the case.

Daniel is rubbing his hair; “Well, not exactly. But kinda. I meant to do it the first two days after I asked for his number, but I always chickened out the last minute. And after that… every time I’d stir the conversation that way, he’d change a subject. And he seems super awkward with me, and totally tenses up when I touch him. So even though we went out to the movies without people barging in on us, and ate out twice, just the two of us... and had tons of fun, nothing really happened, and he didn’t initiate anything either, so I figure he’s not really into me. He’s just really nice and—” 

“Timing on these sort of stuff are crucial.” Dude-guy is saying; “If you wait too long with this, you’ll just become friends, and it’ll become harder and harder to confess.” 

“I don’t want to say David is right, but David is right.” Jaehwan says. 

“That’s fine. I think some things are just not meant to be. I’ll be happy and honoured just to be his friend. He’s the sweetest guy I ever knew. And he’s witty. And smart—”

Both Jaehwan and Dude-guy make disgusted noises at the same time, then snap to stare at each other. Jaehwan squints. Dude-guy sips his beer because he has the emotional intelligence of a corpse.

“Dude,” he turns to Daniel; “Don’t turn this into some textbook pining. Nothing good ever comes out of that.” 

“I’m not pining. I like him, but sometimes it’s just not the right time, and not the right place. And I don’t want to put him in an uncomfortable position.” He sighs and leans back, shoulders slumped and defeated. 

This goes against everything Jaehwan stands for, and he is not the type of give up lightly. 

“It’s almost the end of the semester, anyway.” Daniel says, as if it explains something; “We’ll be busy with tests and assignments and  _ the project _ .” 

“Oh god, the dumb project. They handed out such random themes for an exhibition. I didn’t even start yet.” Dude-guy doesn’t seem to care about this issue as passionately as Jaehwan which is all the more frustrating.

Jaehwan has been invested in this from day one. He has the photos to prove it. Daniel’s love life is a god damn puzzle that needs to be put together, and this is what they choose to talk about? The stupid project?

“What did you get? I got Spirituality.” Daniel rubs his cheek.

“Self-love.” Dude-guy answers. “I feel like just writing self-love and decorating it with glitter.” He snorts.

“What about you, Jaehwan?” Daniel asks. 

“Dedication.” Jaehwan says, and then gets an idea.

  
  


.

 

“Ong Seongwoo, right?” 

It’s a sunny winter day, and literally half of the campus is outside in the plaza. Black-hoodie isn’t the exception. He’s going over some notes and listening to music, actually wearing the same black hoodie that got him his nickname. 

“Oh, heyyy.” He takes off his earphones; “Daniel’s friend!” 

“You don’t remember my name.” 

“Of course, I do… it’s…” He tries to hard to conjure something. “Daniel’s friend name!” 

Somehow this makes Jaehwan likes him more. He can’t really explain it.

“It’s Jaehwan. Don’t worry, I called you black-hoodie for the entire semester,” Seongwoo looks down at his hoodie, as if he’s not the one who wore the hoodie in the morning; “and just now I had to pester Joseph until he told me your full name.”  He points to Dude-guy, standing behind him.

He’s slurping on a matcha milkshake in a safe distance, but clearly looking at them, so he just holds his hands up to say hello. 

“Joseph? isn’t that—” 

“His name is irrelevant, to the matter in hand. I need you to come see my project exhibition.” 

He scrunches his nose; “Why?”

“Because I’m asking nicely.”

“If you were asking nicely, you would’ve used ‘Please’ somewhere in that sentence.” 

Ugh, he and Daniel are really meant to be.

“Because Daniel would like you to see it.” 

Almost like somebody flipped a switch on, his face turns more vulnerable and curious; “Daniel?” 

“Yes.” 

“Why can’t he ask me to see it himself?” 

“I can’t tell you that, but I think you’ll figure it out once you’ll see it. Also if a lot of people will show up, I’ll get a good grade. But like, you know. No pressure.”

“I’ll show up at yours, if you show up at mine.” Seongwoo decides, because he thinks it’s fair, and he doesn’t realize that Jaehwan is helping his sorry ass get laid. 

“Deal.” They shake hands.

  
  


.

 

Daniel arrives to the exhibition late, after Seongwoo already got in, which is perfect according to Jaehwan’s diabolical plan. 

It’s basically a set of 12 photos, taken during the course of 12 weeks, that go from Daniel doodling Seongwoo in MSpaint, to the very last one of Daniel painting a fully colored, detailed,   _ breathtaking  _ digital portrait of Seongwoo.

Seongwoo took his time with each of them, almost as if taking everything in. He’s on the last one when Daniel finally comes in. At first, it’s like he doesn’t recognize that it’s him, in the photos. It’s probably weird to see his back from that angle, but then he gets it. 

And when he gets it, for a long moment, Jaehwan feels like he’s about to beat him up, but then he notices Seongwoo, and they both stare at each other.

Jaehwan walks backwards, sipping his coffee cup, in order to let them have their moment, but still be close enough to hear the grand finale of this epic saga. 

“Look - this…” Daniel starts, and he gets distracted by looking at one of the photos, and rubbing his hair. “It’s not how - well, it  _ is  _ how it looks like.” 

“I don’t really know how it looks like.” 

Ah, the level of cheesiness is over the roof. Another sip of coffee is needed to survive this level of toxic radiation of cheese. 

“I really hate Jaehwan right now.” Daniel takes a long shaky inhale.

Ungrateful bitch. Jaehwan is revoking his bestie title until further notice. He should have a medal of honour for exposing his dumb pining ass. 

“I guess - I started painting you because you were in my line of view, and I was bored - but… then… it became like a thing I got excited for. I Social Studies to be every day, so I could stare at you in close proximity, every day. And as I was painting… I noticed your moles, and your nose and your jaw and how perfect the lines of your face are, and how beautiful you look when you smile - okay, that’s um -” Daniel rubs his face in frustration. “God, this is such a mess — what I’m trying to say… I’m trying to say; that I like you, Seongwoo.” 

“But in a no homo way…?” Seongwoo is scratching his eyebrow, fine lines between his eyebrows, like he’s not sure what to say. 

“No - in a yes homo way!” 

“Oh. But back in the library…” 

“I panicked—” 

“Also your ex is a girl so I thought—” 

“My ex is a manipulative—”

“And then when we texted you never—” 

“I thought I made you feel troubled and awkward with my feelings—”

“I thought I made you awkward, because I thought I was too obvious with how I feel for you, and…”  

Oh my god. 

They’re idiots. 

Jaehwan shouldn’t have ever helped them.

What was he thinking? Wasting his precious time, from the goodness of his heart, trying to get them together? This is just painful to watch. 

“So you like me back…?” Daniel looks confused.

“Yes…!” 

“Okay. Wow.” 

They’re avoiding each other’s eyes, as if they need a moment to digest everything that happened.

Dude-guy finds it the perfect time to appear, and bump his shoulder into Jaehwan’s; “Aw, did I miss it?”

“It was very anticlimactic, Robert. I’m disappointed. Also, my best friend position is available, and you’re a pretty good candidate for the job.”

“Good enough to be your best friend, but not good enough to be called by my name.” Although he says that, he doesn’t sound disappointed or hurt.

Seongwoo finally recovers and says; “Okay - so… now that we figured this out, maybe we should get out of here.” 

Daniel nods, Seongwoo nods back, then starts walking toward the exit, but Daniel grabs onto his wrist all of the sudden, and kisses him. 

Seongwoo draws back immediately, almost as if he needs to see Daniel to confirm that he’s the one who's kissing him. They stare at each other for a moment, then kiss again, this time more briefly. Then share another two more pecks - and then Daniel draws him closer by his jacket, to give him a proper kiss, and Seongwoo wraps his hands around his neck. 

It’s all very 90s romantic comedy, just with more tongue, and people passing by giving them weird looks. 

“I’m going to report them for public indecency. In my own exhibition hall. They have no shame.” 

“Why can’t you just let them have this?” Dude-guy is shaking his head, as if Jaehwan is the one being impossible. 

“Oh, by the way.” He turns to him; “I sent you a thing.” 

“You sent me a thing?”

“Yeah. I saw your exhibition earlier, but you weren’t here, so I sent it to you. Thought you might appreciate it.” 

Jaehwan unlocks his phone. Dude-guy sent him a picture. 

It’s kinda funny, actually.

It’s a photo of  _ Jaehwan  _ taking a photo of  _ Daniel  _ painting  _ Seongwoo _ , during social studies class, because dude-guy was sitting somewhere behind Jaehwan. 

He’s touched. He’s so deeply and emotionally moved by this.

Jesus fucking christ.

He puts his hand where his heart should be located, but dude-guy says; “It’s on your other side, if you’re looking for your heart.” 

“It’s actually in the middle, but it slightly leans to the left. ” Jaehwan tries to correct, but he can’t because he got a clump in his throat - well, almost. 

He clears his throat.

“Jung Sewoon, you just earned the right to be called by your own name.” 

“Aw,” He smiles; “Now I’m not special anymore.” 

 

.

 

Mischief managed. 

Well, kinda.

All Daniel ever talks about is his sexual endeavors, now, and he conveniently forgot that he should be thanking and kissing Jaehwan’s feet for each time he’s getting laid. 

Seongwoo’s sorta cool, though, and Jaehwan is okay with him hanging out with them as long as he’s not constantly with his tongue down Daniel’s throat.

But he got an A+ on his project. 

So he got that going for him which is nice.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> yes, so... hope you guys enjoyed this! :D


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